FN Weekend Open Thread – Build your JayBo Trade

Aside from the Flames suddenly signing a bunch of goalies, the only interesting Flames "news" recently is the Jay Bouwmeester/Detroit Red Wings rumor. This one apparently comes from a source inside the Wings organization, so we can give it a bit more heft than the typical Eklund nonsense.

Roger Millions noted on twitter yesterday that Calgary isn’t actively shopping Bouwmeester at this point, but is willing to listen to offers. If true, that suggests the Wings (or any other suitor) is going to have to convince Calgary to make the move – meaning the package is going to have to be pretty attractive.

Which makes sense, since the Flames are still clearly trying to compete next season. A draft pick and a prospect type package would make sense for the club if they decided to actively pursue a rebuild, but otherwise filling the hole left by Bouwmeester would be essentially impossible in the short term.

While there are plenty of reasons to be unimpressed with JayBo (huge pay check, lackluster offense, not an elite shut-down defender), keep in mind he played the toughest minutes in the league with Chris Butler as his partner. Calgary’s defensive depth would move from "adequate" to "scary" sans JayBo as well: Giordano, Wideman, Butler, Brodie, Sarich, Smith, Babchuk. So even with his too-big paycheck, his muffin of a point shot and bland personality, Bouwmeester remains an incredibly hard presence for the Flames to replace.

Make Your Choice

So your prefered package for JayBo is going to be guided by how you feel about the Flames immediate future. There is a large and growing faction of Flames fans who would like to see the Flames begin the rebuild in earnest now rather than drift into an iceberg later. If so, then it makes sense to shop Bouwmeester for some package featuring a younger player and prospect or draft pick. Of course, if that’s the tact the club takes, then shopping Iginla and Kipper immediately would be the next obvious step.

On the other hand, if you agree with management and want to see the Flames remain competitive, then a Bouwmeester trade will have to include a couple of players who addresses a significant current need on the club: a quality top-6 forward between the ages of 23-27, an elite possession forward (below the age of 35) or at least a defender who can adequately replace Bouwmeester’s minutes.

A home run deal would be to blend the two – land a quality player for now and a good prospect/pick for later. I assume that is the sort of deal Ken Holland or Paul Holmgren will have to make get Calgary to seriously consider things, but you never know.

So for the sake of this exercise, assume both Detroit and Philadelphia are in the running (there are no solid Philly rumors, but it’s an intuitive enough leap). Build your hypothetical package around your preference for team direction: rebuild now, compete now or hybrid. Keep in mind with latter, "ideal", hybrid package will be the toughest to build aand would likely feature a compromise in one direction or the other – the better the established player you demand, the worse the future asset will be and vice versa.

120 Comments |

Still think Philly is the target. If the knock is JBO is overpaid, looking at their roster, they were paying Dman Walker 1.725mill to play in minors & he has 1 more year. Take him in the deal to mitigate the overpay knock. Now make a hockey trade & get a young centre.

I could see Holmgren do something like Simmonds or Read, Wellwood and a conditional 1st round pick if they win the cup (2nd if they don’t).

Looking at the past trades by Detroit (http://www.nhltradetracker.com/user/trade_list_by_team/Detroit_Red_Wings/1), Holland hasn’t really traded away many quality established NHLers in the last 10 years (just quality prospects) so I don’t see Detroit trading Franzen or Filpulla. I don’t think they’d trade Brendan Smith with the defensive short comings they currently have so I could see it being in the range of Patrick Eaves (bottom 6 guy), one of Tatar or Nyquist (high end prospect) and a second rounder which is similar to the Schneider trade they did way back when.

I’m not sure what Jaybo is worth in this market but what I am saying is Holmgren is clearly desperate to do something. When you’re organization is ran like it is expected to be a Stanley Cup contender every year and the team’s current healthy defense up until the end of January is Timonen, Coburn, Schenn, Grossman, Gervais, Bourdon, Gustafsson and Syvret you might have to do something if you’re the GM.

We’re talking about a man who has traded Carter and Richards, signed Bryzgalov to a 9 year $51 million deal and offered Shea Weber and 14 year $110 million offer sheet in the span of 14 months.

Also, I don’t think Simmonds or Read and most likely a second rounder and Eric Wellwood is that much of an overpay. We’re talking one player who can score 25 goals, a prospect and a pick for Jaybo. I’m pretty sure that’s on par for the course…maybe a tad overpay

Agree. If we cant get a 1st back for a top 2-3 dman, something is wrong. Of course no one wants to give you anything for him, they want a cheap fix at our expense. If the only knock is his salary hit, then take a proportionate of salary back. If you are selling your house and the furnace & roof are shot & someone is grinding you 30K on your price, spend the 15K & put in a new furnace and roof & dont allow that to deter your price. I’m sick of hearing about his inflated contract & we get screwed in our return. Good for Feaster for sticking to his guns. Their are no top 2-3 UFA dmen available out there. If the return was just Read & 1st, I would take it but be a little disappointed with that return quite frankly.

I agree with Emir that a team would have to (arguably) overpay to get Bouwmeester out of Calgary (which is why the deal probably won’t happen). But I also agree with negril that “Simmonds or Read, Wellwood and a conditional 1st round pick if they win the cup (2nd if they don’t). ” is a bit much. Holmgren is a crafty guy. He’s not Scott Howson.

what if the Flames made it Bouwmeester + for Simmonds and Read? Simmonds gives us the grit a lot of people have been hankering for, Read gives the Flames a hard minutes forward who will make Backlund’s life far easier. Probably have to include a winger to get the deal done (ie. the +), which might kill it because the Flames don’t have many pieces on forward that weren’t recently signed.

Simmonds OR Read…not both. I’m not sure how good Eric Wellwood is but looking at his stats he looks like a decent prospect but nothing that screams out he’s going to be a top 6 forward and the best the Flames would get is the 30th overall pick.

I’m sure Feaster doesn’t want to make the same move that basically doomed Sutter’s position as GM. He’s not going to make the bad trade that Sutter made when he panicked. I’d rather see Schenn or Couturier but that’s really unlikely. Whereas Read and a 1st from Philly doesn’t seem as quite enough.

If I was running the Canadiens, I would not be moving my 2013 first rounder for less then a king’s ransome (they drafted 3rd overall in 2012). They may or may not draft that high in 2013, but their 1st is likely to be way more valuable then Detroit’s/Philly’s. They know that, and I imagine/hope Feaster would know that too. If you could ship JBo for that pick alone, may be worth thinking about, but we would probably need to eat some cap too. Of course this would signal REBUILD, so can’t see it happening in the near future with this management group.

I agree. Why Montreal look like a great partner as they are into rebuilding with the same venom as we do. Too many passionate fans there that could not handle an Oiler style rebuild. So OK. Not sure how high they were on Kaberle, how about flipping JBO & our 3rd rounder for Kaberle & their 1st?

Jaybo needs to be traded for a big time possession player, someone thats going to take on the big guns. This is the only way that the flames can possibly compensate for his loss defensively. A forward like this and a high profile prospect, and a second round draft pick. I don’t know specific players, just speculating on what gaps the team need to fill most.